Volunqueers Ep 3: Lex Ajello (Ghana, 2019-2020)

Justin Tabor: Welcome everyone, to another episode of Volunqueers, the LGBTQI+ RPCV podcast for the community of — really at the intersection of queer identities and Peace Corps Volunteers. My name is Justin Tabor. I am the current co-chair of the LGBTQ RPCV group. I am based here in Washington, DC, and I am joined today by Lex, who served in — started their service in 2019 and was affected by the global evacuation caused by the covid 19 pandemic, which I’m sure will be part of our conversation today. But I don’t want to give away all their secrets so I’m gonna let Lex introduce themself and then we will jump into our normal sort of flow here. Lex!

Lex Ajello: Hey, everyone listening. I’m so thankful to be here today. Thank you, Justin, and again everyone on the LGBTQ board for having me. I really just want to start off by saying my name is Lex Ajello. I use she/they pronouns. I am an RPCV from Ghana. I started in January 2019, ended March 22 — er, yeah — March 22, 2020. A little bit about me: I was born and raised in New York. I went off to college at UC Berkeley and after moving from kinda east coast to west coast and getting that vibe out there, I never wanted to leave. But ultimately I ended up doing Peace Corps and that’s just a little bit about me and how I got onto my journey. 

JT: Great, great, great. So there’s a lot — in 2019, I was a staff member at the Peace Corps. I know a little bit of — and for those who don’t know, Peace Corps has tried so many different methods of letting people in the door, and you could choose your own way, you could choose, you couldn’t choose… like choice comes and goes and the amount of choice comes and goes. So, Lex, could you tell us a little bit about what was the application like for you? Were you choosing your country? Was it chosen for you? What was that experience like?

LA: Yeah, great question. So, I actually thought that the best thing to do at that time was to apply anywhere. So I actually broadly applied anywhere. You kinda just fill out the application like everyone and once you go through all of those steps, you’ll be invited to either — they’ll give you what assignment you receive. So I actually received a co-teaching assignment in Thailand. originally. And then was selected for an interview and then once you make it to the interview process, you sit down, you have that interview. And my interviewer basically on the spot was like, “I think that you would be a better fit for a health position.” But I was really trying to steer away from that because I knew that was what my resume dictated but I wanted to — I just wanted to go where I was needed. So I thought that applying anywhere was the best choice. But in hindsight, after having my interview and the interviewer telling me that actually it would just be better for you to go with what your skillset is and you’d have a better chance at getting into that program and whatnot. So then after I got rejected from the Thailand co-teaching position, I looked at all the countries that had a health sector, which you can filter on the website very easily. And once I found like, I think at that time it was like 12 countries, I went through each one and kind of just saw what the qualifications were and then from there I was able to narrow it down to like four countries that I qualified for. And then also just want to assess any health risks, like maybe if you have asthma or COPD, you’re gonna want to stay out of countries with certain air pollution happening and whatnot just for your own safety. So I was actually between Albania and Ghana and I don’t know, this is really cheesy, but I actually flipped a coin. And was like, that’s the one that I’m gonna apply to. So I ended up flipping heads, which was Ghana, and I sent in my application for Ghana about, maybe a month or so later. I heard back and then a few weeks after that, I got selected for the interview, and then a few weeks after that, they said that my cohort I was selected for would leave in January of 2019 and I think at that time, I had my acceptance by like September of 2018. So I had that, like, few month buffer to kind of get everything together before I left.

JT: That makes sense, yeah. I was a placement officer so I used to do those interviews. Sometimes you just start looking at someone’s resume and you’re like, gosh you just belong over here. [both laugh] And that Thailand program, it used to be — it probably still is, I don’t know — but Thailand was really in-demand and so…

LA: That would have been such a great country to go to. [laughs]

JT: I lived in Thailand for two years—

LA: Aw, see?

JT: It is a great country. I can tell you that. But I wasn’t a Peace Corps Volunteer there, which maybe contributed to why I had so much fun. I’m sure Peace Corps Volunteers in Thailand have a lot of fun as well. 

LA: I went there for my honeymoon so I definitely know that it’s an awesome country. [laughs]

JT: I guess backing up before the application, what was the draw of Peace Corps? I think people have a lot of reasons for joining. What was yours?

LA: Yeah, of course! So ironically, my aunt and uncle were actually some of the f— they were the first cohort for Sierra Leone in 1962. For those of you listening, like Peace Corps started in, I believe, 1960 or 1961.

JT: ’61 was the first group to go out.

LA: And for those of you listening, Ghana was one of the first countries started, so.

JT: They were the first.

LA: We have longevity. But anyways, so yeah, my aunt and uncle actually did Sierra Leone in 1962 to 1966 or ’67. I can never remember. And I used to ask them all the time about their service, all the time. And they would never tell me. Like, they literally just wouldn’t tell me anything. And then finally, I got to an age — I must have been like, I just got out of high school so I’m probably like 18 then at that point, about to go to college. And I seriously told my aunt and uncle that I was serious about wanting to go to Peace Corps after graduating college. And they were like, “We’ll tell you this.” And I was so excited! I was like, “ooh, the mystery is finally going to go away.” And they said, “Basically, if you have to ask, you’ll never understand.” And that just sparked so much curiosity and it really made me interested in what they meant. And really my aunt after that, she was kind of like, “Your uncle’s just being, like, a butt, basically.” [Justin laughs] But he was just trying to say like, it’s an experience that you physically, mentally, and emotionally have to go and experience to understand what those people go through when they serve for Peace Corps.

JT: I don’t know if you’ve experienced this since coming back but like, people ask you how it was and you’re supposed to fit like however long you did service for — for me, it was three years — and you know, to fit all of that into a 60-second beyond like, “it was good. It’s hard. It’s so hard.” [laughs]

LA: I know, I love when people just go, who ask me, people who haven’t done Peace Corps, because I do have that little like 60-second blurb that I’ll give out. But when you talk and sit down with another PCV or RPCV, you’re just like, you’re shredding with each other like everything that really happened because they can understand that experience as well. It’s just so unique, which is why Peace Corps Volunteers are such a specific breed of human because like, it’s just such a unique experience.

JT: It really is. I think a lot of different types of people can be successful in Peace Corps. There’s so many ways to find success in Peace Corps, but it definitely attracts a certain type of person. [both laugh]. 

LA: It does.

JT: And that, I like that type of person. I haven’t met a PCV yet that I haven’t — I always say that I can always spend a night with a PCV, like we’ll find enough to talk about for like, a 24-hour period and we might get on our nerves after that but like, the day with most PCVs.

LA: Whether I want to or not, I’ve definitely spent days with PCVs [laughs] and get that experience.

JT: So you’re thinking Ghana, and you’re working through the process. At what point did sort of, or did- did your identity sort of factor in? Were you doing research on that in advance, or were you sort of in the camp of like, nothing’s perfect and I’m just gonna go along with it?

LA: Yeah, so, I’ll backtrack a little bit and just let our listeners know that I, at that time, personally identified as… well, I reclaim this word, so I identified as a butch lesbian. Others can call me a masculine lesbian. And at that time, I used she/her pronouns and I was fully using my legal birth name Alexis. But for the sake of this podcast, everyone listening, I’m only gonna be referring to myself with that name. Otherwise you can know me as Lex. But initially, I really just thought service would outweigh any of those personal identity concerns and I realized that now as an adult, looking back 5 years ago, that was just pure ignorance. [both laugh] It really was. Yeah, because, you know, again for those listening, having to take your identity that you’ve kind of just come out to yourself, come out to the world, and like really started to just experience yourself and who you were, and then having to put all of that back into a box and conceal it again and then tuck that box away literally and metaphorically back into the closet. It was definitely a mind— it was confusing. I don’t wanna curse. [both laugh] 

JT: We haven’t done a lot of cursing yet. I’m not opposed to it. [both laugh] But I know where you’re going.

LA: It definitely messed with your mind, that’s for sure. But I didn’t realize the severity of how much it was messing with my mind until probably having left my Peace Corps experience. So I really like put it into the box, turned the key, put the box in the closet, shut the door, like just didn’t worry about it. And that was not healthy, which again is why things such as this resource is so good to listen to, for us to be able to tell you all listening, like don’t make that mistake. 

JT: Yeah. It’s so hard. And again, having been on these interviews and seen the process and met so many people in Peace Corps, you see — I’ve seen a really wide range and I… try to be really respectful and like understanding of all of it, because like, for some people, it’s not an issue, right? Like it’s a non-issue who I am and this doesn’t factor in, and for other people, it’s like their whole thing and like, “I couldn’t go without this part of myself.” And so, I get that it’s a range, but it always definitely raised a red flag for me when someone was like, “naaah, I don’t worry about that. That’s fine.” I was just like, maybe maybe you should worry about it a little.

LA: Yeah, I wish I had adjusted 5 years ago talking to [laughs] but I did not.

JT: That’s just a plug. I think that’s really well-noted. Do the amount of due-diligence that feels right to you in considering Peace Corps and do some country research, you know? I think, especially Ghana — I don’t know if you keep up with Ghanaian politics —

LA: I do.

JT: But they’re in a really tough LGBTQI spot right now with those new laws and I bet that changes the math for a lot of people these days on whether Ghana is a country they feel comfortable going to or not.

LA: Yeah, and you know, Justin, it actually really should. Like for any of you, those younger volunteers maybe coming or wanting to be volunteers coming right out of college. Those are maybe the global concerns that you haven’t quite sat with and really thought about, because that was something that I wasn’t thinking about and I wish that I had. Because at that time, my — I did know being in Ghana, being any part of the LGBTQI+ community was criminalized. So you could be jailed if you were seen doing any kind of homosexual act in public, you could be jailed. And I did know that, which obviously, like yeah, that was really scary to hear and think about. And then you’re kinda just telling yourself that “no, I’m gonna be smart. How could this ever be— how could I ever be put in a situation where something like that could happen?” Well, it can. It just can.  And, you know, for those — again, I obviously enjoyed my service in Ghana but there were good parts and there were bad parts. But I did honestly look at countries at that time not with the lens of like, are they LGBTQ friendly or are they not? What are those countries’ laws? Who do they protect? Who do they not protect? I do think that that is a really important factor that this up and coming generation of LGBTQI+ people should really look at before going into service, just so that you can feel safe while you’re in country.

JT: Mm-hmm. And there’s some really good resources for that out there too. I’m not tech savvy enough on this podcasting stuff to know exactly where they’ll live but I will try and put in — there’s some great ILGA. If you’re not familiar with ILGA, ILGA is the International…

LA: Lesbian and Gay Alliance?

JT: I think that’s right. I know the L is lesbian. I was stumbling on the G. But they do some really great international work and they produce a yearly report on a status. They make a really nice map that you can click and kind of get information really quickly. Maybe I can just put the link for those resources within the episode notes here. That will be a place people can go and check if they’re interested in looking deeper into some of those stats. I think that’s a good time maybe to pivot towards actually entering service and going to Ghana. I guess I’m curious, at the time, you described yourself a butch masc lesbian woman. How was — and was that recei— how did people in Ghana receive that?

LA: Yeah, so very very interesting. Again, just like for people who haven’t had that cultural experience, like I had not been to any country on the continent of Africa up to that point of my life. But something specific to Ghana that I always still to this day find very interesting: In order to get someone’s attention, you actually have to hold their hand. So when someone’s talking to you, they will grab your hand, not like interlocking your fingers, but just like grab your hand or your wrist. And same thing when you’re walking and talking, they’ll grab your wrist or your hand. And so you’ll see people of all genders doing this. So like, men will hold men’s hands, women will hold women, women with men. And it is completely like attention-based, or platonic, I guess you could say. And it’s so ironic and funny because us as Americans and westerners, we see that as like totally just out of this— let’s say a hetero person from America saw something like that, if two women were holding hands or two men were holding hands, they would just presumptively assume that that is a queer relationship. And I think that’s what’s so fascinating, like coming from a western mind-set into that Ghanaian space, that is not at all how they viewed it. So we, as PCVs, we learn during our training like, you can do that with your fellow PCVs and that was safe. So you know, that was one way, because I was dating, at the time in Peace Corps, a woman who did ultimately, for those listening, become my wife. 

JT: Aww, Peace Corps love.

LA: Peace Corps love, we love it. Like three people in my cohort ended up getting married. [laughs]

JT: My cohort was a very connubial group as well.

LA: Peace Corps love, we love it, we love it. But yeah, it was just really interesting. So you could do that with another PCV and a Ghanaian would think nothing of it. And so that was one way you could kind of fit into their society while still holding onto your identity and not having to compromise your safety. So you kinda learn those nuances of the culture, and I always found that very fascinating. And same thing with clothing. Because a lot of the clothing that they receive in Ghana is going to be like donated clothes or hand-me-down clothes, only in the major cities will you have stores that are actually selling new clothes and those are usually the affluent Ghanaians who are purchasing things like that or the expats being there. So they had something specific to Tamale. They called it the pile day. So you’d have a pile of just clothes, and there’s the cedi pile, the 5 cedi pile, and like you’d go crazy. Like you’d find some good stuff in there. If anybody has ever read that moose (?) sweater book, it kind of refers to that, where that person donated a shirt and then found that shirt when they served in their country with their name on it. Basically they followed their clothing, essentially. I forget who wrote that off the top of my head but anyways, the point is, you’d have men and women shopping at the piles and they would be purchasing clothes that we, again as westerners, like that’s gender specific to male, that’s gender specific to female. But then you have guys buying skirts because they just need clothing. They don’t see it that way. And so again, it was really fascinating because I could still wear my masculine clothing in Ghana and not feel unsafe because they didn’t perceive my clothing as gender specific.

JT: Yeah, it’s really— I love stories— like, the same thing happened in the Philippines, where you couldn’t do that across genders, like for me as a man, to touch a woman would be very inappropriate. But that made same sex touching very okay. So like, I remember you would walk with your arm around another man, holding hands would be a bit too much for the Philippines. But the Philippines people sort of circle up to drink and whoever’s sitting next to you always has their hand on your knee and it’s just like, it feels like an awkward touch but I know we’re just being friendly.

LA: Right? It’s just so interesting cross culturally how different all of those hand gestures are, facial expressions. Like, obviously we have those universal things that we all know now, like when you put your hand out for a selfie, we all know let’s take a picture. Or like just smiling is happy, but there are certain things we just don’t know when we go into those cultures.

JT: I’m curious if you had this experience of like, I feel like it’s really common for people to sort of be very worried about being outed or found out, like you have that anxiety coming in and then you go to the country and like, whatever the signifiers of that there are like not ours. And so they don’t read— you are presumed straight, you’re presumed whatever because they’re just not reading you that way. Is that the same in Ghana?

LA: Yeah, completely the same. So it was actually funny because I actually did shave my head before I left for Peace Corps, but that was completely unrelated to my Peace Corps experience. It was just my thought process… Well, I guess maybe it was related. My thought process was that I had this long, long, long hair, and I knew that I was gonna be– specifically to the community I was gonna be in, it was said on the website that we would be taking bucket showers and the running water was not as available in certain communities. And so I was like, oh, washing my hair is gonna be really difficult so why don’t I just shave my head? [laughs] I don’t know. Again, these were the [inaudible] 22 years old. So anyways, I did that. But I did start a little bit of a trend because once we were there, like 4 days in, I ended up shaving like 4 people’s heads so we had a little cult going of shaved heads. But—

JT: Like Sinead O’Co— maybe this is too old of a reference but like Sinead O’Connor bald head?

LA: Like Brittany, like Brittany Spears.

JT: Okay. [laughs]

LA: We Brittany-ed each other. [laughs] Oh gosh. But— and something that a Ghanaian woman actually had come up to me and she told me like, “ah you’re a woman, but from the back, you look like a man. You should put earrings in.” So she actually gave me these little studs and I wore them my whole service and if you saw earrings in someone with short hair, you would know that they were a woman. And so that was a very easy identifier to also like, again, cross-culturally make sure that I was safe. But yeah, to answer your original question, I personally had anxiety when I got there and couldn’t identify other Peace Corps Volunteers who also identified as LGBTQ. That was nerve-wracking. But it was because like, you know, you get thrown into training the first day you arrived, or at least we did. And you’re getting off that 14 hour flight and I was the knucklehead that sat in the front row and fell asleep. Like I was so jet lagged. And my cohort still busses me about it but it is what it is. But yeah, I just, I was seeing people and you’re trying to identify them yourselves and you have the PCVTs. For those that you don’t know, that’s the Peace Corps Volunteer trainers, so that’s usually somebody in a cohort before your arrival who gets trained and selected to be the trainer of your group while you’re going through PST, which is pre-service training. And so our PCVTs were incredible because they very quickly noticed some of us who were struggling identity-wise, whether it was a person of color or like certain affinity groups. Like Muslim, if you were a person of color, if you were LGBTQIA, these things. And they were like, calm down, we have affinity groups already in place. We will all give you access to those affinity groups in just like two more days’ time. We just need to get through some certain administrative stuff and then we can put you all in those groups. And so once I entered the LGBTQ affinity group for Peace Corps Ghana and I saw how many volunteers there were, I felt significantly less isolated and my anxiety definitely did drop.

JT: That’s good, that’s good. It’s nice that they kinda had that prepped for you all and that that was a resource in place. And I know that’s like a growing practice for a lot of different countries. Let’s pivot here. Tell us a little bit about the work that you got into and some of the projects and accomplishments that you had as a PCV.

LA: Yeah! Oh man, this honestly is one of my favorite things to talk about because I love telling people that you’re gonna have this idea of what Peace Corps is and you’re gonna leave and not have done anything that you thought. Literally. So for those listening, I had a very unique experience, specifically I was put in the northwestern region of Ghana. And I was actually evacuated from my first site. So I had spent a total of 4 months there, right? Yeah, only 4 months there. And I was evacuated due to the civil unrest that was happening in Burkina Faso at that time. So 36 volunteers were in the [upper]eastern region, the ][upper]western region, and parts of the northern region, and they had to create a buffer zone for us. So just imagine kind of like the border and they wanted to put like a few hundred kilometers between us and that border to make sure because there was unfortunately an event that happened in one of the churches there. And a host country national, which we refer to as HCNs, was injured and assaulted and so they were like, we need the volunteers to be safe, which did play a really interesting role in the — kind of this idea of how, because we were under the federal government program, Peace Corps, like it was a really weird feeling to be like, oh this civil unrest is happening and like we’re going to leave but our community stayed. And so that was a really weird feeling to have to grapple with and say goodbye to our community members and whatnot. But those 36 volunteers, we ended up going to what we referred to as “the sad conference”, and that’s where we found out we were being evacuated. And then we had very unfortunately like, I kid you not, like 2 hours to pack up our stuff at our site and then Peace Corps drove us back. And then some people got placed into new locations, some people were close to their service ending so they just got to COS, that’s close of service. Some people decided that they were just gonna take the IS and leave — that’s interrupted service, sorry. We have so many acronyms, y’all. Honestly, this is like rebooting my own memory. [both laugh] But yeah, so— and I was so adamant with my ACPD at the time. I don’t even remember what that acronym stands for. Assistant…

JT: Assistant… Assistant…Country program…

LA: Director. Boom. There ya go. I think that’s correct. So my ACPD, his name was John. He actually just passed away this past year, which was a huge loss to the Peace Corps Ghana community. We loved John though. He was an amazing, amazing person. He worked for Peace Corps for like over 20 years as the health sector APCD, just an amazing human being. So I worked intensely with him to not [inaudible] to another community because I was so traumatized, to be quite honest. Because I had gotten so close and I actually marked high in my language test, so I really dedicated myself to learning Dagari, which was the language I needed to know for my community. And pretty much like, very conversational, I was doing pretty good, not to toot my own horn or anything. [Justin laughs] You know. Yeah and so I really just didn’t want to go back to a community. I wasn’t ready. And he was like, okay. But I told him I really wanted to stay in country. I wasn’t ready to leave yet. It had only been six months since I’d been there, so I was like, this is not how I wanted my service to go. So he ended up connecting me with an NGO and it actually is the oldest NGO in Ghana. It was originally called New Energy and Abad Mohammad Ali is his name, he just goes by Ali though. And he was the founder of New Energy. And he had a subsidiary NGO that he was just starting called Hikma Agro Services. So John connected me with him. I interviewed with him and he was like, “You’re hired! You’re gonna be the new program farm manager.” And I was like, “oh my gosh, I literally don’t think I’m qualified for this.” [both laugh] Which I very honestly want to say like, I was definitely not qualified for this. So I did tell him that and he actually threw me into a managerial— I don’t want to say a conference but like a training. So I ended up going to this place in Tamale where I spent two weeks doing managerial training and that was actually extremely helpful. And I did feel much more prepared after that. Like I learned how to do a budget, how to figure out Excel, I had to learn how to interview, hire, questions to ask, the whole shebang. I really got an intense two weeks managerial training. So once I came back from that training, he set all these goals for me of what he wanted me to accomplish and in the time he wanted me to accomplish them and we did. That’s what we did. So long story short, I became a farm manager for Hikma Agro Services, and our entire project and mission was that we were creating a bio-fortified yam for the Northern Region of Ghana. So we partnered with scientists in Nigeria, we worked with the, I think it’s called the SIIR, the Sierra Institute of International Research in Ghana, and the Climate Exchange Innovation Research Center, some acronym like that. And we essentially— the scientists created a bio-fortified yam that was more nutritious, looked exactly the same as the regular Ghanaian yam, and drought resistant. So that was really important because for those of you who don’t know, because of all of the things happening with the climate, it’s really affecting the weather. Obviously we know it’s affecting weather patterns but if you’re a farmer in Ghana and you’re so used to every April that’s when you lay down your first seeds for crops and then you don’t get the first rainfall thought until maybe the end of May, you’ve just wasted your year’s salary on the seeds that you were hoping to produce for your family, basically, and then you go and sell those crops. So the farming has become more irregular in Ghana so we wanted to create a drought resistant yam and we did. The yam itself was called a tuber so we put the mother tuber in a box, we would line up the vines and then it would just grow up and at a certain point, we’d have to cut them. So you cut at each node. So who did we hire for that? I’m really happy to say that we— I interviewed and hired 16 Ghanaian women, some with children and newborns. And I trained them and then they were the ones that did the work and then I was in control of the finances, the budgeting, I paid them, I trained them, everything. So it was just such a beautiful project and then to see people come and purchase our first set of actual mother yams was just, it was crazy. And then we did a nutritional testing where we went into a community and used our yams vs regular yams that they would buy at market. And when we did that nutritional taste test, essentially, I just remember— Ghanaians, they love to make this tongue sound where they’re like [inaudible] or they— which kinda reminds me of Drag Race with all the [inaudible] which really cracks me up. [Justin laughs] Or they do like [inaudible] they make that sound a lot when they’re excited about something. I remember all the aunties just making that sound and they’re like, “Ah! It tastes the same!” And we’re like, “Yes! That’s the whole point.”

JT: That was the point!

LA: And then, you know, when you can really, for a project like that, get the women on board, because you have to remember those are the ones that are cooking those meals and buying the products at market. If you can convince them that the product that you’ve created is exactly the same as you’re already using but it has all these extra benefits so why wouldn’t you use it, then you have so much more community buy-in. So we went community to community to community, trying to get that buy-in and that ultimately [ended in] the success of that project. And I’m still happy to say that after leaving, even with the pandemic, they’re still going on. Four of my original hires actually are like, now one is the farm manager, so took my position. One is the director now, and one is servicing as the VP, and one of them is still a node cutter for the vines. But they’re like the expert node vine cutter. So I just think that’s absolutely incredible and that was something I was really really really proud of and not a lot of my peers really knew what I was doing because I was— it really was like a real job. 

JT: It almost sounds like a Peace Corps Response job, the way you were paired up with something and had a very specific job title and not necessarily tied to a community as much as to like a project and a goal. But that’s really cool that Peace Corps was able to put that together for you, to kind of make something out of a bad situation like that. That speaks volumes for Mr. John.

LA: Yes. We loved John. He was great. Yeah so that was kind of what happened in my service. So like you said, it was very like Peace Corps Response and it was kind of a random story but it all worked out and turned out well for me. [laughs] But the best thing that came out of that entire project was— so the big cable news network of Ghana is called Joy News, so equivalent to our CNN, ABC, etc. And we got in contact with them and we were able to get them to come to our project and they did like a 20 minute documentary on the farm.

JT: That’s so cool.

LA: Which I did have a small cameo in. [Justin laughs] But yeah! And so that was just something that was really really cool and I could send that to my family and be like, this is literally what I’ve been working on for the last year. Look at what we’ve done. And it was like a very tangible item that I’m just, yeah I was really proud of.

JT: She is camera ready, so everyone out there… [both laugh] Hire this person. So then you got moved away from this community, you asked not to be in a new community. What, I guess I’m thinking more on, not on the work side of things, on like the personal side of, like, where were you while you were doing this, where were you living? Who were you close with? So like on the day to day, when you weren’t at work, what were you doing?

LA: Ah! That’s such a good question. So for reference, in my first community, I did live with a— I don’t want to say a host family, it was more like a host mom, who was an old lady. And I could only say her name by screaming it, like that was how she taught me to say her name, which was hysterical. And then she had a young boy that lived with her and then a teacher lived in another room and then I lived in a room. So that was our community. We would eat communally together and whatnot and, like, do things together. But then, so once I moved from our community, which was called Owlo, by the way. Just want to shout out Owlo. And—

JT: Shout out to Ulu! [Lex laughs]

LA: Spelled O-W-L-O. 

JT: Look it up, look it up. 

LA: I do— if you look up Dafiema— you can find Dafiema on Google Maps, but you can’t find Owlo, unfortunately. Not yet. I’m trying to get them on the map. I’m trying to get them on the map. [laughs]

JT: Google, if you’re listening, get Owlo on the map, let’s go!

LA: [laughs] It’s like 2 kilometers from Dafiema. So then when I moved and that sad conference happened, I actually was housed in the Peace Corps… what are they called? Oh sub-office. So, I actually lived in the Tamale sub-office for Peace Corps for about a week while John was figuring out everything for me. And then once they figured everything out, they did the same type of arrangement that they would with a community. So they had to provide my housing and they had to… That was it. I think they just had to provide my housing. So then that was really interesting because I actually lived in the city of Tamale, like a regular… person. So obviously it’s not a city like San Francisco or New York, but for Tamale, it was very city-like. It’s very busy like all hours of the night, like something’s happening, events, etc. So I lived actually like in a little gated compound that had other little apartment rooms in it. Yeah, it was actually quite lovely. It was honestly better than my college dorm room. It was nice. Like it was a one bedroom, one bath, with a little outdoor screened in kitchen. It was beautiful. I loved it.

JT: During my service, I also, I was an urban volunteer, so I was in a city of 500,000 and I rented a two bedroom house for $60 a month.

LA: Yeah, see? Isn’t that crazy? [laughs]

JT: It is maybe the nicest place I’ve ever lived.

LA: Right? [laughs] Oh my gosh. I don’t know, I think mine was 1,000 cedis a month, so. And 1,000 cedis if I’m not mistaken was like, oh I don’t remember. It was 5 to 1 when I was there. I think the currency’s changed but whatever 1,000 divided by 5 is in US dollars. I can’t do that math. Yeah, so it was about 200 US dollars a month. So still the cheapest thing I’ve ever lived in but still actually quite expensive. But they had a pretty good currency exchange rate in Ghana while I was serving. 

JT: I mean, also, when Peace Corps is paying for your housing, they want you to pick good housing, so.

LA: Exactly, yeah. Which a lot of my fellow volunteers loved visiting me because I did have running water and a shower, so.

JT: Yeah, I was the urban volunteer with an extra bedroom. I had a lot of guests.

LA: Yeah, exactly. [laughs]

JT: Were you able to make Ghanaian friends and if so, how— were you able to be open with them? Were you able to like talk about identities, who you were dating, that kind of stuff?

LA: Okay, so I specific— probably one of my best friends in Ghana, his name was Wahed. He was basically like my secretary. He did everything I needed him to do, essentially. So I worked with him on the farm and I became really close with the women that I also hired. And I know, you know, people might be listening like, oh aren’t you not supposed to mix business and person? In Ghana, that was a very, that was very much a cultural thing.

JT: A Peace Corps didn’t mind at all.

LA: Yeah, exactly, like my CEO, Alhaji, he invited me over to his home like probably three times a week to have dinner and lunch. You can’t say no to that, that’s unacceptable. So I was very close with him. I was very close with Alhaji’s son, actually. He was the finance, what is it? CFO, I guess. The CFO of the whole NGO, so he basically cut the checks for everybody when I had to go to the bank and get it and whatnot. So I was really close with him. And he was dating at the time. They— Wahed and him were very open-minded but I still never felt safe enough to tell them that I personally was queer, or like identified as that. But we would have conversations about— I always kept it like theoretical. So it’d be like, they’d ask questions about like Americans. “What do these Americans do? I don’t understand how a man can be with a man or a woman with a woman.” We would have those types of conversations about identity and whatnot but I never crossed that line of telling them that I fell within that category. Because you know, you still get a lot of pushback, and they are a very religious country so whether it was like a Muslim identity and/or another faith… Was Catholicism, or some type of Christianity. There were a lot of different religions represented in Ghana. And yeah, so I never personally crossed that line of telling. I actually never told any Ghanaian while I was in Ghana that I identified as queer. But I did— well, I guess that’s not true then, because I did meet two Ghanaians who identified as gay themselves, but they were in some type of underground queer community. And there was a way that people who identified as queer found out about each other. It kind of almost goes back to maybe like when we were in middle school and people used to wear certain colored bracelets and they meant different things. Or the bandana things? If you put a bandana in your pocket, it means certain things. It was kinda like that so they had created this underground community of— if you had a certain bracelet from this specific organizations, like you had to know someone in that organization to receive said bracelet to make sure that you checked out as a real person, so that you weren’t just some undercover person trying to jail someone, essentially.

JT: That’s really wild. That’s like… I mean, I guess you have to, in something where security is a life or death matter, I mean that’s smart, scary, it’s a lot of things.

LA: Yeah, there’s a lot of feelings there for that. 

JT: Yeah.

LA: I just remember feeling a lot of pain when I met them. And just knowing that I have the opportunity to go back to America after my service and like I get to live my truth but there are people here who are trying to fight the fight but they’re just meeting wall after wall after wall. But again, I think those people were the ones that are just absolutely so courageous, because you need those types of people to [inaudible]. Otherwise you won’t ever see change.

JT: Yeah. Was there much— I don’t know if you know this or not. Was there much of an online community and presence?

LA: There was. So I personally did not go on any of the online dating apps because I personally was in a relationship and, you know, had to keep myself in check. [laughs] But I had plenty of actually male-identifying PCVs within the community who did use the apps, but they got really good at knowing when someone was like a fake profile vs a real profile. And when you knew that was a fake profile, you knew that was probably an undercover police officer who was gonna meet you and then arrest you. And so they learned different nuances of how to navigate that. So I do know people that used the app very successfully. I do know people that personally were able to have intimate relations with host country nationals, both female and male, in same-sex relationships. I just personally never had the opportunity to meet, in an intimate way, another queer-identifying Ghanaian. I maybe saw some during my service. I definitely saw some. But I never personally befriended like a queer Ghanaian.

JT: I guess, as you’re in this environment, service is going on, obviously you weren’t able to complete your whole two-year assignment, unfortunately, due to covid. I guess as— if you want to talk— I know some people are really still traumatized by all the covid 19 stuff. I’m wondering how that played out in Ghana and as your service was winding down in a quicker way, how did that go? What happened?

LA: Yeah, so, I don’t want to be too morbid but I want to be real with our listeners and let them know. Peace Corps Ghana lost an RPCV. She, who was actually signing on to do their third year, so they had already done their two years of service. She passed away October 26, while in Ghana. Well, technically she was in South Africa at that point for medical reasons. Passed away and then we held a memorial for her in early November. So the Peace Corps community in Ghana, obviously was completely devastated. We were all completely wrecked from that situation happening. So by the time winter break came around, which, again for our listeners, a lot of people do go home for winter break or they’ll take that time to travel to other countries and whatnot. So I feel like a lot a lot a lot of people ended up taking that time to actually go back home, which not everybody does, but I definitely know a lot more people did it that year than normal, from what I was told from other cohorts. Everybody just needed a break. So then we all came back from that break like in the beginning of January or 2020. And we’re all just kind of going about our service like normal and we all end up eventually, like I think, the end of February, we start hearing lingers of this global pandemic. And then it becomes like early March. And I had become really attuned to other countries because I was in an affinity chat for a global chat. And it was people in that chat who actually gave the tea. They were like, “Yo, this is what’s really going on right now.” And so I remember telling my cohort and everybody just brushed me off. And again, for everybody listening, the reason that a lot of Ghanaian volunteers, or I should say Peace Corps Volunteers in Ghana brushed it off is because Ghana’s one of those countries that has stayed open during every single national, world, worldly issue that they’ve ever experienced. So like 9/11? Didn’t close. Civil unrest situations? Didn’t close. Like, nobody thought in a million years that Peace Corps Ghana would ever close. They just couldn’t fathom it, which I completely understand now, looking back. But in that moment, I was very angry, like nobody believed me and all these things. So I really started spreading the word that something was happening globally and we need to start preparing ourselves. At the time, my partner, who is now my wife, she was like, “I think you’re onto something.” [Justin laughs] Like, I’m telling you, something’s not right. So I started just completely chatting our Peace Corps Ghana chat and people would get in these crazy Whatsapp fights. Like people did not want to hear what I had to say. But some people listened and I remember getting some phone calls and they were like, “Do you think we’re gonna get evacuated?” I was like, “Yes, like we are going home. Something is happening, not just in Ghana but in the world. Something’s not right.” And I think it was one of the South American countries, if I’m not mistaken, got the news first. I know everybody got the news, I believe, on like March 16 from, I believe at the time it was Jody who was the director of Peace Corps. She sent out that letter, which actually ended up being like 2am Ghanaian time. And so that’s when we all knew, yeah we’re being evacuated. But somebody in South America broke the news before Jody did to global volunteers, and it was that message from a South America volunteer that I screen shotted and sent to my cohort like, guys, this is happening.

JT: See? Told you.

LA: You better figure out your cat, your dog, whatever you need to figure out. It’s about to happen. And that’s exactly what people did. Everybody in my cohort was calling me. They were like, “Are you taking your cat home? What are you doing? Bahhhh! Do I need to pack?” I was like, “Yeah, pack your bags, get your shit together.” I was like, we’re outta here. And we literally did. From that message, they had to like segment our leaves because we had people all the way— like every country probably had a crazy… Everybody probably has a crazy evacuation story. I have no doubt. But this is just my personal experience with Ghana. I was a PCVT at the time. So I actually was already in Accra with the new cohort that we were training to go into service. We… We know… this is complicated because, again, it’s kind of like your bureaucratic issues. We wanted to get that cohort signed in— sworn in— because if they were sworn in as PCVs, they could get the benefits. Exactly. And they literally were two days away from their swearing-in ceremony, so it wasn’t like we were trying to really finagle, like “oh they still have three more weeks to go” or anything. Like, they were just a few days shy. So we worked with the US embassy and Peace Corps admin in Ghana and then at the regional level of whoever the African continent director was at that time, or maybe West African regional director. And we were able to get them sworn in. So that was something I was really happy we were able to do because I can’t imagine, like you had just left, just went through all this training, just to go back home like… We were all devastated no matter what part of your Peace Corps service you were in but I was like, oh my god.

JT: No, it was— That was during the time where I worked at headquarters. It was wild on the inside too.

LA: Oh a hundred percent. I can imagine the stories that you have… So long story short, they segmented us. So they were trying to get everybody from the furthest part of Ghana back down to the city as quickly as possible. So those people really had the shortest time because they had about a 12 to 20-hour journey to get back down. And the Peace Corps bus was picking people up. And because of that, it had to make multiple stops along the way. So obviously there’s logistical problems every which way you can imagine. 

JT: Yeah. I like the idea of a Peace Corps bus

LA: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. You got the like 20 luggages up top. Inside, people are shoved in, people are crying. And then we had another horrific experience happen where one of our— actually someone in my cohort— they ended up, they were at a bus stop at like— Usually when you’re driving along, you’re stopping every 3 to 6 hours to go to the bathroom. And so they were at one of the rest stops, and she got hit by a car. And this is literally the day that we have to evacuate Ghana. So like, anything that could go wrong in Peace Corps Ghana was going wrong and every— I think a lot of people were just at their complete wits end between the sad conference happening for those first people at the very beginning of the year, Chi passing away, and now this global pandemic. And then our— I don’t want to name her— and then our person in our cohort getting hit by a car. We— everybody was just absolutely wigged out. And so it was really interesting because I took my experience as… someone who had been evacuated already and I really just shut down and compartmentalized, hundred percent. And I was just trying to help everyone and anyone basically get through and understand like, it will be okay. It’s really really hard right now and you need to feel your feels. Do not try to compress them at all. Oh my gosh, now I have a scratchy voice. This is what happens when I talk too much. [Justin laughs] And yeah, just feel your feelings and let it out. So there were obviously a ton of emotions happening. We were the last plane out of Ghana. We had to charter a flight because it also had like 7 other African countries on that plane. And in Ghanaian airspace, you cannot leave after 12 midnight. It’s just not allowed. So the US embassy had to call the Ghanaian president for our plane to take off so we could leave. Oh my gosh, it was crazy. And then there were people on the manifest for the flight who weren’t included but who were supposed to be on there but some people from USAID and some other US organizations got their names on the flight so then they had to get taken off because it was like, we were prioritizing Peace Corps volunteers. It was literal chaos and insanity. And I’m not even doing justice the day that it was. It was obviously horrific. It was traumatic in so many ways, but I also think whether people in my cohort realized it or not, it was probably really good for us to go when we did because I think there was just so much trauma compacting onto itself and I think that’s what happened. Because when we all got home, we all desperately needed therapy. [laughs]

JT: Yeah. There— I’ve heard so many re-countings of different countries— the way covid went down. None of them have been pleasant. Like no one is like, it was great. That was a great plane ride. They’re all crazy and they’re all— my heart goes out to all the evacuees because you don’t plan on that and you don’t want that and that’s not the punctuation you want on your Peace Corps service. But to your point, I think— I worked on the inside and I do love Peace Corps. I won’t critique Peace Corps more than I need to but I think Jody, the Peace Corps director at the time, made a really hard decision but I think, I think closing Peace Corps and bringing everyone home to be safe was the right decision. I still think that was correct.

LA: Definitely. Based on just, again this is just my own personal opinion and experience, but based on everything that happened while covid did ensue while I was within American borders, like even within America, I couldn’t imagine if I got sick. And I actually know several really good friends from Ghana who ended up passing away because they did not have access to medical care, and that was the hard decision that, at our federal level, that they needed to make.

JT: Yeah. Yeah. And as Peace Corps has started to thaw out and people are going back, it does say something that like, I think that the safety of Peace Corps is kind of one of its larger selling points for a lot of people. So to be able to point to covid and be like, no one died from covid because they were all safely at home. That does reinforce that idea— Safety and Peace Corps is controversial—-

LA: I know—

JT: They’re a little babied by Peace Corps.

LA: It’s so nuanced though because you can do the survey of the 100,000 volunteers who have volunteered and who are still with us and like while there were definitely aspects of Ghana that were not safe at all, I felt more safe in Ghana than I probably do in most cities in America. Truly.

JT: Yeah? Okay, so now you’re back home. Let’s kind of switch gears again and talk a little bit about what life has been like post-service. Obviously there was immediate trauma and you can go into that if you want, or if you’d rather kind of move on, you know, more positive or interesting things that have happened to you since service.

LA: Yeah so a lot of people love to ask this question or just like, what’s the best thing you learned while you were over there? And I really love to tell people, Peace Corps is not something that I take away from these experiences and like I learned XYZ. No. Peace Corps for me completely, from the ages of 22 to 24, 22, 23, however old I was. It shaped my mindset, it completely altered my values, it increased my self-awareness, and the biggest thing that it did was it significantly influenced my personal growth. And I say all of that to say like it led me onto a journey of self-exploration that I don’t think I would have gone on, had I not done Peace Corps, until maybe my 30s or even my 40s or maybe never. And I say that with the most sincerity because Peace Corps, to tie it back to my identity, it forced… it truly just forced me to reflect. It allowed, at the time, Alexis to really confront her gender dysphoria. And I say that because you will have those nights that I’m sure you remember that you’re alone, you’re sitting with your thoughts, whether they’re good or bad. You have to find the coping skills when maybe you’re having some type of anxiety, when maybe you’re suffering from depression and you don’t have the name for what you’re experiencing. But being aware of yourself and aware of what you’re going through. That was just so fundamental to completely making me grow up and become more mature. Like, I really remember sitting there and having these conversations with myself and not understanding why I didn’t feel right in my body. And it was a conversation that maybe in college, I definitely had those thoughts, but I never took the time to really sit with myself and explore it. And I was forced to explore that in Peace Corps, there’s no doubt, because you are silent at night and you’ve got nothing but your thoughts. So I got fully acquainted with my internal dialogue. And, you know, after talking to some volunteers and realizing that other people were experiencing these internal dialogues about other things in their lives made me realize that what I was experiencing was not unique. Maybe the topic in my head that I was talking about, basically, was unique but that sense of having to confront yourself, it’s very Peace Corps-specific. You just have so much time with yourself that you need to— you just find yourself, really. I know it’s so cliche but I don’t know how else to say it. And honestly, that time of reflection— so jumping back now to being back in America, I’m dealing with the death of a volunteer that I completely compartmentalized, I’m dealing with two evacuations that I’ve compartmentalized, and now I’m dealing with gender dysphoria and what does that mean for me, my mental health, and my body. And I’ve got all these things, and my partner, we moved to San Francisco together once we left Peace Corps and we ended up getting jobs at the Food and Drug Administration. She did medical device inspections and I did food safety inspections. So I was in the food sector. And that food sector, just to go off topic for a second, I got really involved with that because of everything I did with the yam. So while I went in to be a health volunteer, I then transitioned to like an agriculture volunteer and then I got really really into nutrition, food, and how does public health play a role in your nutrition. So then that’s why I got a job at the FDA and I thought maybe I was gonna go down this path so I kept going down this path. So I was like, okay let me go and get a masters, so I went and got my masters in public health with an emphasis in LGBTQ studies but also with nutrition and environmental. So I was really like, okay I think I’m finding myself. While simultaneously, to jump back a little bit, I’m on this complete gender journey. So I finally got the help that I needed. So I sought help with, thankfully, the support of those around me who knew that I was struggling, who didn’t see for myself. And after I got this help, it was when I realized during one of my sessions where I just felt so lost because I wanted to be able to run my hands down my chest, basically, and be able to wear a men’s shirt because I was so masculine presenting and have it actually fit. And so that whole idea right there is what we would call gender dysphoria. And talking to my therapist at the time, I truly felt like I was taking a spot from someone who was trans, because I thought in order to be— like, if you’re transitioning and like going through gender affirming surgeries, like I’m less than because I don’t want to transition to become a man, I just didn’t want my breasts anymore because I didn’t identify with them. So while I’m really having this internal battle of what does this mean for me and my body and my identity, and all of the societal pressures just really got to me. And I just remember them saying, “you don’t need to want to be a man to transition.” And I was completely just absolutely aloof after that. I was like, what do you mean? [laughs] I was baffled! I was like, there’s no way. I was like, “no, in order to transition, you have to become a man. That’s the whole point of transitioning.” And they were like, there’s a spectrum. So it really wasn’t until that conversation that this whole gender being a spectrum and me falling within that spectrum like opened up my eyes to what it was. And I got really passionate then about LGBTQ issues because also at that time, politically, we were experiencing a lot of anti-trans legislation in the country. And that was devastating. Like, it was devastating to hear people who were on hormone therapy had to stop. People who had gender affirming surgeries that were— like had surgeries planned and they had to cancel those because they no longer had that service to them in their state. Like, I was crushed. I really was. I was devastated and I was like, how can I make a change? And again, getting top surgery is no easy feat so for those out there listening who don’t understand what gender affirming care is, it is not something that you can just do overnight. This was a three-year process for me just to be able to go and get this surgery. Like a lot of intention goes into this. It’s not something that you just wake up and are like, yeah I’m gonna get this surgery today! 

JT: Cut this off, please. Thank you.

LA: Yeah, exactly. [laughs] And for those who are like, well you can pay $25,000 and you can go have your breasts enhanced. Yeah, that’s true but shockingly, in the world of gender affirming care, even if you want to get a breast reduction or a double mastectomy, you actually still can’t go and just pop in with $25,000 cash and get that surgery. You still have to have a letter of support, which takes about a minimum of a year to get from a licensed clinician. I think that example is a really nice sort of reminder that when people want to do things to their body that are permanent but don’t result in something that’s outside of the binary, people don’t really have a lot of issues with that. For example, getting a tattoo: very permanent, but you can walk off the street into most tattoo parlors and they’ll do that for you without a lot of concern. Whereas anything that leaves someone outside of that binary spectrum, suddenly there’s forms and doctors and all this rigamarole and so I think that’s a really great reminder for people.

LA: Like, all of these things are happening at once. So I just got my masters, I’m just about to get my top surgery, I’m just about to quit the FDA, I’m transitioning to a new non-profit that services LGBTQ unhoused, undocumented and foster youth in San Francisco. So everything’s just changing all at once. And it was really, like, not even within my first month of working at the non-profit I was working at, the kids truly just inspired me to live my authentic self. I was like, why am I— who am I trying to please? I only get one life to live and it’s mine. It’s mine! Nobody else’s. I should do what makes me happy. And so I got my top surgery on July 14, 2022. I believe it was just a few months after my 25th birthday, and I felt like a completely different person after. I will never forget the feeling of waking up from that surgery, brushing my hands down my chest for the first time, and knowing that my only regret was not having done it sooner. And that whole experience that I originally kind of was running from back in 2018 when I graduated college, which originally, I always wanted to go into medicine. I completely detoured, so I took about a 6-year detour and ultimately, my top surgery led me back to medicine and it’s been such a beautiful journey because I truly, truly, truly thank my Peace Corps experience for this, because had I not basically opened and unlocked those inner demons that I was experiencing, I don’t know when I ever would have felt this way or gone onto my career path that I wanted to but never felt I could achieve. And now I’m so excited to say that I’m in my first year of medical school. My goal is to do gender affirming care as a future physician, whether it’s through the surgical route or through hormone therapy, working specifically with LGBTQ youth, if I was to do the hormone route. And obviously like youth and adults if I went the surgical route. I’m completely dedicated to servicing marginalized populations, the BIPOC community, specifically with that emphasis on LGBTQ identifying people. And, yeah, I just— It’s really just a really weird full-circle moment because it took me 6 years to get here and a huge part of that is the 15 months of my service in Ghana. 

JT: What’s coming to mind— I don’t know the word— I’ll phrase it this way. You can push back if you feel differently. I think, you know, there’s an interesting conversation in the Peace Corps ethos about privilege. There’s a certain amount of economic privilege to go and volunteer here for two years. I can acknowledge that. My family, specifically, was sort of lower-middle class. We could do some things but not everything and that kind of thing. It’s also time. Time is such an interesting part of your story, and what you’re doing that those long conversations at night with no electricity and the inner monologue, whoever you’re talking to— I was thinking about that this morning in the shower. Because my husband is Filipino and I was thinking about this, “I wonder if he talks to himself and like what language is that conversation in?” That’s what I was thinking. [Lex laughs] But then, like some people would call that— like some people pay money to go meditate and I think that’s what’s happening when you meditate: I’m having a conversation and I sort of timed out of everything and made a space to meditate. And there’s sort of a privilege in Peace Corps where you have put yourself in a position where there is nothing going on, so you have that chance to meditate, to have that conversation, to really expound upon yourself and question yourself. So like, I don’t know if that’s a question or if I’m just posing that out for you to have thoughts on. But you gave yourself that gift of time and it seems to have really paid off in a focus that drives you now.

LA: One thousand percent. I think so many people get really scared when they think about the 27 months. If I’m being so frank, I am only like 5 to 6 years older than some of the youngest students in my medical class, and ohhhh my gosh, oh my gosh, do those 5/6 years make all the difference. They— some of them have never experienced failure. Some of them have never experienced rejection. Some of them have never had the opportunity, whether it be financial — which I completely understand — or interest or curiosity to even travel outside of the state’s borders. And to have the opportunity to not only live in another country and to speak another language and immerse yourself in a culture, that is one thousand percent a privilege for those people that do do Peace Corps. And a lot of Peace Corps Volunteers will tell you, like, I got more out of my service than what I think I could have provided for my community. And that’s a dilemma I know a lot of PCVs face in that regard, but… I could not be more thankful than having taken that time, because while it does feel like, wow, oh my god, 27 months, that’s sooo long. Two years of my life? Ugh. It goes by so fast. 

JT: It really does.

LA: It’s just crazy. And not only does it go by so fast but I really like to look back at the grand scheme of everything, like I really just take that step back and I look at my whole journey and I think back like, okay, I’m about to be 28 and I’m looking at my whole journey so far. And while I may be technically a non-traditional, older medical student, and same thing with my wife because we’re both in medical school— Shout out to my wife because she’s incredible, and once again, Peace Corps love, we love that. I think about it when we’re gonna be like, let’s just say like 45. These 6 years that we took for ourselves— One, we wouldn’t have met each other. Two, we wouldn’t be at the skillset, maturity level and like emotional intellect that we are at had we not taken that time. And three, at the end of the day, when you’re 45 and you’re in a career that you love because you took the time to really figure out what you wanted to do for yourself, those 6 years really like, they don’t add up that much on the total of what you’re gonna do. If I’m in my career for like 30 years and I just took a detour for 6 of those out of 30? I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I had done the right thing.

JT: You’re also like— Most people go to Peace Corps, they’re not just sitting on the beach and hanging out. They are making a concerted effort to do something productive, which is often actually the frustrating part of Peace Corps. You would like to be more productive than you can be… I love reddit. And I feel like one of the common things on reddit is like, “Should I do Peace Corps? I’m so worried that 2 year gap in my resume—“ It’s not a 2 year gap in your resume, one — “The 27 months is gonna set me back from all these people that are in my field.” And I never agree. I’m always the person who says— and maybe if you’re listening, I’m the person that left you a comment that said this — whatever you plan to do in your life, Peace Corps fits into it. It will teach you skills— And Lex mentioned all of these things. It will teach you skills that any other person in your profession is going to wish that they had. If you’re going into banking, you’re going to be the banker that also speaks French. You’re going to be the doctor who also knows about agriculture. You are going to be the teacher who knows what it’s like to be an other, right? Like it teaches you something that adds depth to whatever technical skill or whatever thing that you know how to do. And all of those young people who are coming out of college, they’re going to only have the technical skill. And maybe they have it a little bit fresher than you but any hiring person knows that I would love to have a person that’s a little bit more tested and emotionally stable and has this extra set of skills that compliment so much more of what we’re trying to do here. I can hire any person and train them up on the technical skills. But to have that depth of experience that Peace Corps gives you just adds so much flavor and richness to whatever you’re trying to do. So there are a lot of factors to consider but I never encourage someone to think about it as a waste of time. It’s always a development. You’re always learning and always growing, and it’s only gonna add to whatever you bring to the table down the road.

LA: I feel a lot of people like to push back. Like specifically now, today’s world, I know there’s like a movement for like abolish Peace Corps. And you know, I’ve had so many very genuine conversations with so many people who have been in service and who have not been in service about their takes on Peace Corps. And I think the countries that are doing it right, where they acknowledge neocolonialism, they acknowledge the white savior complex, they’re acknowledging these historically systemic issues of what it means for us to be there and they put that into your training and they actually have those conversations, and not only do you have them with your peers but you’re having them with host country nationals. And you focus on the sustainability element of your service vs like trying to write a grant and pump out a latrine project, for instance. That’s a point I really want to drive home, like if I had any advice for a future volunteer, don’t go in trying to be that grant writer. Don’t try and go and build that water tower, because the reality is, if you can work rather than on the short-term grant projects but really use the local resources, the local NGOs within your country, if you can engage in the community, if you can get community buy-in and work on behavior change processes. Behavior change processes can take your whole 27 months! And I think people just don’t understand what that means, and if you can approach service with a long term mindset for sustainable impact, I still see a reason why Peace Corps should be around. Because we do learn so, so much, not only about ourselves and our host country nationals, but we learn so much just being in that country.

JT: Yeah. It’s… yeah. The abolish Peace Corps, the white saviorism of Peace Corps, I can understand those critiques. I had a whole thing on it in a different episode, which, I don’t know where it will fall in terms of this… Those are valid critiques and there’s nothing wrong with acknowledging it and confronting it. Peace Corps can probably do more, which is what I said elsewhere. But when you— I think part of that is that American baggage of wanting to produce and to show something for these two years. And that’s on you as a Peace Corps Volunteer to divest yourself of that and to kind of buy into that notion of like a ripple effect. And you don’t get— For me, as an education volunteer— I think that you had a lot of— I don’t want to say because maybe you feel differently. You had a luxury, somewhat: You got to grow something, right? Like you could see there are actual potatoes in this world that I helped grow. That’s a physical thing that you could kind of point to. I was an English teacher. Like, there’s nothing to show, right? [laughs] Someone learned English and I saw that in a two-year period and then walked away and if that had an effect on them, that’s really great. I can’t take total credit for it. I don’t try to. But I have had students who came back and said, “Having an American in the classroom gave me confidence.” I can’t measure confidence, I can’t see confidence. It takes them actually writing to me on Facebook messenger like, “Hey Mr. Justin. Remember me? I’m more confident because of you.” And I’ve had enough of those to like reassure me that I did good. But like, it is very hard to tell an American to turn off that productive part of our— that built-in capitalism that says you have to produce cogs at the end of everyday, and just be comfortable with “sometimes in the future, I will know that I did good and it will reveal itself in time.” And especially as a 22 year old, I don’t know that I was ready to hear that. 

LA: Right, exactly. [laughs]

JT: As I approach 40, I’m more comfortable with that idea. It’s— The other thing I’ll say, and I think you raise really good points that you are a really good example of this, Lex, is that Peace Corps is a federal— Let’s go back to the evacuation. Peace Corps is a federal program and it’s funded by taxpayer dollars. What Peace Corps is about and why Peace Corps keeps getting money from Congress is because Peace Corps benefits Americans. And what Peace Corps hasn’t done a good job of and what they’re starting to do — I think they have a whole campaign ongoing about this now — is what are the dividends that Peace Corps has paid domestically, because what they haven’t done a good job counting is how many people did 15 months of agricultural work and are now some of our best doctors, right? And I mean, that’s 100 percent you. How many people went into service and came back and have been award winning teachers or made so much money on the stock market? These are contributing to their local economy. These are— It’s funny, you can put a dollar amount on a Peace Corps Volunteer. I think a two-year service is something like $100,000 of taxpayer money. Please don’t quote me on that number. But that $100,000 of taxpayer money does pay dividends to the American people. It develops us, it makes us a better group of people. So like, no that doesn’t help the people of Ghana necessarily, but it does help us as a people and it makes us better and there’s a value to that as well. It’s a multilateral organization. 

LA: We have the three points of service, which we’ve beaten to death. No on our podcast, but it’s on the website and everything. We don’t need to get that one.

JT: Peace Corps doesn’t need more promotion. 

LA: Exactly. But to even add to that point, I know so many Peace Corps Volunteers who went into medicine and I’m telling you right now, having people have the opportunity to go abroad, live abroad, experience another culture, another culture’s healthcare system, and then come back. And again, we’re not doing anything that we’re not supposed to be doing. I’m not talking about these medical mission trips that some people go on. No. I’m talking about in the CHPS clinic, I just sat down and worked administratively with the nurses. I got to watch certain things happen and see them in action but I was never performing anything. I just want to make that clear for some people. And while I did have a medical background, technically, legality-wise, I was an EMT for 4 years, but again, I— that’s not my scope. That wasn’t my place. And I knew that going in there. And I can only tell you that I truly believe empathy is one of those things you can’t learn. You either have it or you don’t. I know a lot of people like to disagree with me on that, specifically my wife [laughs]. But I’m telling you, like the stories of experiences I have in Ghana, I know being able to come back to America and service people when I do become a future physician in just a couple years. I’m going into that community with a completely different mindset than somebody who just stayed in America their entire life and never has had any secular experience to understand another perspective, another culture. And I’m so excited for when I do have that diverse population that I’m working with, because I truly believe that I’m going to give exceptional care because I, well one, I do care. But two, I have that empathy that you just…

JT: Forged in the fire.

LA: It really was. You just see and experience things in Peace Corps that you can’t get in America anywhere.

JT: Yeah. Yeah. It adds depth, flavor, nuance. Whatever word you want to put, it adds so much that again, going back to elevator pitches, it’s very indescribable and ephemeral… I think we’ve kind of run through all the questions. We’ve gone beginning, middle, end. We’ve had a nice arc there. I don’t know, are there other things you want to talk about, other important points you think we’ve missed about your service?

LA: If there’s anything I could add for those listening it’s that if you can believe in yourself and accomplish just one thing everyday that can be as small as just like getting out of bed. And that might be like, well yeah that’s obviously pretty easy. No, it can be really hard. Like, if you’ve never left the country, just to pull from not my own experience but my wife’s experience. She had never left America before going to Peace Corps. And she just did it. She just jumped right into it. And she was really successful but she was successful because she had a group of volunteers that she became close-knit with and became friends with. And we all were emotional support for each other. And you know, people like to throw around the term like, we trauma bonded, which technically is true. But at the same time, you don’t— you can’t penalize yourself for maybe not going into the community that day. Or maybe not making yourself dinner that day and having to go buy that waakye. And that’s okay. It’s all a part of your journey, your experience, your growth, everything. And honestly, you’ve got it. There’s no reason not to do Peace Corps, and plus you’ll miss out on all of the amazing like How a PCV Puts It memes.

JT: Yes!

LA: And then you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s because you haven’t done Peace Corps. And you’ll never understand if you don’t.

JT: Yeah! And the FOMO right there should be a motivator to join. [Lex laughs] The world of memes that this opens up.

LA: No, but I really, I want to say thank you, Justin, for your time. I would love to just give a brief shout out to my wife. For those of you that don’t know, her name is Liz Dakin and we did meet in 2019 and I told you I had that shaved head and fell asleep during that first training. But yeah, we ended up hitting it off and we just got married in San Francisco in June.

JT: Amazing. Congrats.

LA: Five years later, y’all. That could be your love story if you want it to be. And we — two queer people — met in a country where it was illegal to be queer. So, again, just another element of craziness added to our own love story.

JT: We started off talking about how back in the day, you didn’t necessarily do a ton of research. And it worked out really really well, right? Maybe a best case scenario. And so like, trust the— To me, what I’m taking away is trust that process, trust your instincts and listen to what’s going on around you and good things will happen. In Ghana, do they have sort of a— In the Philippines it’s mahalana [sorry for the spelling], whatever will be will be, kind of thing.

LA: They do! Oh man, I don’t remember what it was in Twi but they did say something along the lines of “you can’t change it”.

JT: Yep. Maybe a little fatalistic, but one of the things I believe in is Peace Corps magic. And I’m not a religious person, not even really a spiritual person, but I do think there’s something about Peace Corps. It draws you in, and as you do it, it puts you next to people you’re supposed to be, puts you in a place you’re supposed to be. Ghana wasn’t your immediate thought, right? The Philippines wasn’t my immediate thought, but I think for me and based on your story today, a lot of wonderful things have happened because we went to those places and had those experiences. And I think part of that is going— leaning into the experience and the unknown and trusting that something good is going to pop out on the other side. And there are bumps along the way, but as your life arcs out, those imperfections will smooth over and you will not remember them as much as all the good things that are behind you.

LA: Sure. Some of my best— some of the best humans I could ever have met in my life are basically all from Peace Corps. So every time somebody has a wedding, it’s basically just a Peace Corps reunion. 

JT: Oh my gosh, yes. [both laugh]

LA: Which is incredible. 

JT: Yeah. And eventually, it’ll settle down and then you don’t have to do that anymore.

LA: Right. Then you actually just have to plan a reunion.

JT: Then it’s the baby showers.

LA: That’s true. That’s the next chapter.

JT: Well on that note, this has been a really lovely conversation. Thank you, listeners, for joining us today. If you are interested in learning more about this community of people, please visit our website. It’s www.lgbtqirpcv.org. That’s a lot of letters. So I’ll just say it again. lgtbqirpcv.org. We are a really great and wonderful growing community, if you’re interested in joining us, please reach out to our board and we’re happy to link you into what we’re doing. There are lots of ways to connect and to share stories, to find people, and we invite everyone to take part in that. Thank you, Lex, for joining, and hopefully everything in the future works out really well. I wish you the best in medical school and everything going forward.

LA: Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And again, for those listeners out there, if you need anything, just reach out to Justin and the board and they can get you connected with me if you want to have a specific conversation. 

JT: Aw, look at that. [laughs] Alright, thanks everyone, bye!

LA: Bye!